Maravi

Worst yet to come if floods are left unresolved - Rev Matale

Worst yet to come if floods are left unresolved - Rev Matale
By Masuzyo Chakwe
Mon 05 Apr. 2010, 04:01 CAT

COUNCIL of Churches in Zambia (CCZ) general secretary Reverend Suzanne Matale has warned that the worst is yet to come if the issue of floods is not tackled once and for all. And Lusaka City Council (LCC) public relations manager Chanda Makanta said there is a lot of political interference in the allocation of plots.

In an interview, Rev Matale said the issue of floods must be taken very seriously in view of climate change. She said there was need to find a permanent solution as the worst was yet to come if left unresolved.

“We as Zambians and the government have a responsibility to plan for these problems for the next season. We need to look at the drainage system maintenance and bringing in of new ones. This will help in future,” she said.

Rev Matale said there must be a limit of growth for shanty compounds, which in most cases were illegal.

“There is need to re-plan these settlements so that they include proper drainages because releasing money every year when we have these problems doesn't solve the problem. The entire planning system must be looked into. The worst is yet to come if we encourage these unplanned settlements,” she said.

Rev Matale said another solution could be to open up new settlements where the basic services would be provided. She cited compounds like Kanyama and Kuku where permanent solutions could be found.

She said political interference in the running of councils must be prohibited because the country was where it was now because of it.

Rev Matale said Zambia's politics must be reconfigured as political parties had no role to play in the allocation of land.

“This (political interference) must be condemned and political parties must ensure that their parties do not interfere in council because they are the ones that have put us in this situation,” she said.

But Makanta said the flooded areas experience these problems every year because the people on those areas were not legally allocated the land.

“What I have noticed is that this issue is beyond the council because there is too much political interference. You find that it is the ward chairman or councillors who allocate this land and people build structures without getting proper advice from the council. If they did, the planning authority would not allow them,” she said. “We may be the planning authority, but it is beyond us.”

Makanta said moving people from one area to another when flooding occurs was not the best solution. She said the council had even prepared a report that the relocated people should not go back to the respective areas because of the nature of the places.

She said the Lusaka City Council was in discussion with sister councils to see if the displaced people could be relocated there.

“You know that Lusaka's burial sites are filled up and there is scarcity of land. It is for this reason the council went to Chibombo but they were skeptical about a burial site and would rather we take development in terms of infrastructure. But we are still discussing because some of the displaced people work here,” she said.

Zambia Institute of Planners (ZIP) president Simeo Siame last week said no amount of shifting families from one disaster location to another is ever going to provide a lasting solution to the problems of floods.

Siame said professional advice was abound on proper land use practices as well as environment protection and preservation, which by and large had been ignored by the same people who now felt that the government owed then restitution.

He said facts show that available township master plans and land use maps would show that the land that was eventually invaded by squatters was zoned as open space since it was not found suitable for human habitation.

Siame said despite this fact, home seekers still moved in and commenced construction. He said the construction of buildings was never approved or supervised by anybody, let alone a qualified town planner. He said such structures were located on solid rock with hardly any thought given to drainage channels because there was no planning authority in charge for a layout plan.

Labels: CCZ, SUZANNE MATALE

posted by MrK @ 3:49 PM